Chuck Wagon

An edge rusher with character questions who is disgruntled? Jerruh is licking his chops.

Edge rusher is their biggest need they didn't address in the draft. Their defense was really bad creating pressure last year. We don't really have one of those to spare. Love the Martellus Bennett for Leodis deal (though I'm not sure if the value is quite there for the Bears). Bennett gives us a big "homeless man's Gronk" type TE next to Clay (more of a move TE). I hate the Cowboys, but I'd love to ship Freddie there to allow him to end his career with his hometown team and give us back a 5th round pick next year, solving our RB log jam. (I know many fans would revolt, but that's the one place that's a good story from Fred's side and he's redundant with the skills of other guys we have). If Alex Boone is on the block, he's my top realistic offensive line trade target. McKelvin for Boone suits me pretty well.

More or less yes, beyond a few good apples, I think ESPN has sacrificed much of their journalistic integrity in order to profit from click bait headlines and creating non stories to fuel their 24 hour news cycle. For example, they employ people like Mike Rodak to troll the Bills because they know they'll get more clicks by having a clearly biased anti Bills reporter writing stories which then get posted on internet message boards and passed around emails with people saying "Did you see what the idiot said now?". In Kiper's case, his value lies in his name brand. You have to remember, ESPN's target market isn't people who care enough about sports to post on internet message boards, they know they've already got us. They are looking for casual fans who know little beyond "I've heard of Mel Kiper" when it comes to draft analysis. I think most of what Kiper says and writes is his personal beliefs, it's just that he really doesn't know nearly as much about the game as his pay grade and reputation suggests. The people who understand this dismiss him, the casual fans don't know that much.

That's pretty much how I feel as well. At the time of the pick, I was livid that's the direction they took with Fisher and AJ Cann still on the board. I'm still not exactly sold on Miller relative to those two guys and wish we would have moved back in the 2nd with news coming out that teams like Baltimore were desperate to jump up, but I can rationalize the age of our other corners and the importance Rex puts on the position in his scheme. At the time (and even still a bit) it felt like the same old Bills drafts I've watched for years, desperately hope a guy is on the board when we pick, he's there and we go in a complete opposite direction while a non-Cleveland AFC North team grabs him (I swear the Bengals-Ravens-Steelers get almost every single guy who makes me say "how is he still on the board?").

I can write his column for him: "The Bills brought back Alex Carrington, he was a much better player last year when he was leaving the team, he's just a backup and a foolish signing who will cost them a comp pick in the formula, hooray, Go Pats!"

"The commissioner has come to the conclusion they gained an unfair competitive advantage, however since Bobby Kraft threatened to send Roger to his room without dinner AND promised nothing bad would ever happen again (double pinky swear), there will be no punishment levied at this time."

I'm a believer in a kick off specialist who can drive the ball out of the back of the endzone as a waste but the Bills didn't agree last year. I really like what guys like Saban and Urban have started doing in college after they moved the kick offs up, instead of driving it out of the back of the end zone, they overload the coverage to one side of the field then have a kicker who can hang the ball up like a punt inside the 20. That puts a lot of pressure on the returner, he knows he has to catch the ball, is likely to get popped soon after catching the ball but is in an awkward role/spot to just call a fair catch.

You were probably the wrong one to reply to, there are others who are taking the more ridiculous stance that no one not getting paid for their opinion has an informed one. I agree with you that there's a tremendous amount of unknown regarding how this plays out. That was the original intent of my post before I went sideways a bit. There's no real true expert because you simply don't know how these kids are going to respond to their new environment. There's 250+ kids whose worlds got flipped upside down this weekend, most are moving to new unfamiliar cities and most will shortly be seeing more money than they ever have in their entire lives. That's a culture shock for even the most level headed 22 year old.

These are humans and there are a ton of factors that go into success. Scouts can reach a consensus on a guy's football ability, all place him in the top 5, have him get picked there but the human factor trumps everything. You don't know if the kid is going to think he made it at that point and stop lifting the extra weights or watching the extra film, or allow the wrong people around him to help him make bad decisions. Just because someone isn't paid for their opinions doesn't make them invalid. I watch 12 hours of football every Saturday and have for nearly 20 years, I read all I can about the draft, I know who most of these guys are and have paid attention to them for 2-3 years worth of playing on Saturdays. I know people in the league and they've told me I know what I'm talking about when I talk football. I have no interest in pursing a true scouting path as my career pays me much more than that path would and I'm able to go home to my family every night. I know there are plenty of people out there like myself. Most getting paid for their opinion were not only willing to travel extensively for most of their lives, but also take jobs paying nothing and did not have someone they weren't seeing while on the road. Even then, in order to get into the business you usually have to know someone in the business. Anyone who has spent any time around business environments knows nepotism is a frequent fact of life and qualified people are often left out in favor of the known individuals. To suggest in today's information age that someone who isn't traveling to North Dakota Technical Institute to watch one random lineman can't possibly know as much as those who are is utterly ridiculous.

#BrownsaregonnaBrown The few Cleveland sports reporters who aren't afraid to be critical of the organization (who've been shut out by the organization while they feed all their puff pieces to Mary Kay Cabbage) paint the picture of an unprofessional organization who thinks they are smarter than everyone else in the league. Nothing has changed there since Shanahan was asked to be released from his contract and guys like Jordan Cameron said they had zero interest in returning. Everyone talks in the league and these rookies have talked to guys in locker rooms, Mariota is a boy scout who always says the right things and there were rumblings around him they wanted to go anywhere but Cleveland.

The formula basically seems to be "How many rookies will start day 1" + "How did they fill the perceived media needs created by spending 5 minutes looking at a depth chart and highlighting guys without well known names" + "How much of the benefit of the doubt they get based upon track record" + "How many name brand draft guys did they take" + "How off base did they make my projected picks look". He said he likes the Miller pick but today he's been saying we should have taken Bryce Petty, who 22 teams passed on after the Miller pick. He had Darby as his 130th ranked player, which sounds absolutely ridiculous given what everyone else has to say about him.

I wonder if Parker (or his mom) said something to the Browns before the draft. I thought as soon as Shelton and Parker fell to #12, they should have been working to move up from #19 to #13 and taken both Parker & Shelton with the two picks, that move may not have cost much considering they had a plethora of later round picks and the other 1st round trades came at a pretty low price. I also wonder if there was a bit of a hesitation to take wr at #19 knowing the kid would always be compared head to head to Sammy. While I'm sure that wasn't a primary factor for their decisions, it wouldn't surprise me if that was in the back of their minds. The one WR they did take (Vince Mayle - 4th rounder) is both smaller and had worse combine numbers than the guy we took in the 7th. I'm biased against the Browns, but given what they were working with in terms of draft capital, I think their draft was pretty "meh". Shelton replaces Phil Taylor (who can't stay healthy), Erving replaces Alex Mack (who wants out of town), Orchard is a depth guy behind Kruger/Mingo and likely replaces Kruger long term, I like Duke Johnson and think he's better than West/Crowell but Jaelin Strong fell all the way down for 70 and he's another guy they could/should have used some of those late picks to get, Xavier Cooper might have been their best pick and actually upgraded a spot, Campbell in the 4th felt like a reach given their safties and the quality of the position that fell late/went undrafted, already talked about Mayle. I did like them grabbing Ekpre-Olomu in the 7th, I know he has the knee but I couldn't believe he fell that far. Looking at their draft in hindsight, it felt like they were purposely pulling the George Costanza move and doing the exact opposite of what they thought they should do. They didn't use any late picks to move up into position runs, moved back in the 2nd and took no flashy players outside of Johnson. They look like a deeper team but unless they found some gems (possible given how many picks they had) they didn't really upgrade any glaring holes. They'll still likely face teams jamming the box because Bowe & Hartline don't look to be able to beat single coverage consistently, unless Gabriel or Benjamin take huge steps forward they'll still struggle to stretch the field.

Baltimore wanted Taylor back and Ozzie is universally praised for his scouting. We know what Cassel is, he's played decent for stretches of his career and proven to be a capable and willing mentor to young QBs. EJ is obviously a question mark, but I don't see Petty/Grayson/Mannion/Hundley as noticeably better prospects than him. There's a bunch of former decision makers who've been fired by multiple teams out there saying our QB position is screwed. If anyone cared what they thought anymore they'd be paid enough to leave ESPN or other outlets behind in a heartbeat.

I'm fine with them dinging us not having a first, my problem is they did the same thing last year. So we fail both drafts because we traded our '16 1st? Seems like a ridiculous standard. At the end of the day it's all ridiculous BS media garbage. These guy's supposedly study these draft classes year round, then produce their big boards that are often wildly different than the actual drafts, their big boards require 5 + revisions in order to get anywhere near what the actual draft ends up being and then they blow it off by saying "There's no way anyone can actually project the draft." ESPN helps perpetuate their myth by burying any past results and there's zero accountability on the work they do. At the end of the day these media experts are little more than glorified weathermen and Kiper is the Willard Scott of the bunch, a dinosaur from a bygone era ESPN trots out to flash his ridiculous hair and spit out easily google-able info he spent the previous 6 months memorizing.

"I gave the Bills a hard time in the draft grades last year because I thought they paid far too steep a price to move up for Sammy Watkins, given how many good WRs were in that draft. Watkins is going to be just fine, but Mike Evans and Odell Beckham, Jr. could have both been taken without moving up, and that move up now factors into the grade this year, when the Bills didn't have a first-rounder and simply couldn't add the same amount of talent as other teams. I thought Ronald Darby was a reach in Round 2 at No. 50. There's a lot of natural ability with him, but I didn't have CB as nearly the biggest need, and I don't think he was the best player available, either. I'm a lot higher on the third-round selection of John Miller, a physical force in the run game, which they need to succeed to take some pressure off whoever is taking the QB snaps. (There's some buzz that Tyrod Taylor could be really pushing for that role, by the way.) Karlos Williams provides some depth at running back, but I'm not sure how much they needed it, and I might have looked at one of a number of values to be had at linebacker in that range. That said, if Rex said he needed it on defense, my guess is they would have made the move. Nick O'Leary can stick because the competes like heck and can catch the ball. I also think Buffalo got one of the bigger steals in the draft in Dez Lewis, a big-bodied speedster out of Central Arkansas who doesn't look the least bit out of place from a physical and workout standpoint next to the first-round types. The Bills didn't need an amazing draft, thanks to good roster-building outside of QB. That's a good thing." -Kiper

He also said we could have gotten Mike Evans staying at 9 last year. Ridiculous calling Darby a reach. There's a handful of blue chip guys in every class, then a large group that could go anywhere from 1st to the 3rd depending on team needs and teams boards. Darby is squarely in that group. Just because Kiper thinks he belongs in the 60s and he goes 50 doesn't make it a reach.

So we didn't get Corey Crawford after all? He was one of our first guys reported and the one I was the most excited about.

I can't help but wonder where Seantrel would have gone in this draft with a year of keeping his nose clean, staying in the lines in a NFL program and not completely embarrassing himself on NFL tape. DJ Humphries and Donovan Smith don't feel like any better prospects than he is and it seems like (hopefully) Seantrel has turned that page in his personal life.

Darby is a guy who easily could have gone in the 1st round in this draft and had he gone to the right team earned that team a high grade. Not having the first really hurt us in the oline market as that's where the 1st round run hit, but it's tough to argue guys like Marcus Peters and Kevin Johnson are well ahead of Darby.

Media guys love Leonard Williams, from everything that's come out, teams aren't quite as sure. Once the Jets got him at 6 they could have gone to the golf course and missed the rest of their picks and they were going to get an A. Add in they took a name value QB and its a slam dunk high grade. The Pats get the benefit of the doubt and we don't, simple as that. When they took Jordan Richards several people said they thought he'd go day 3 but it's the Pats so you have to think they know something you don't. Judging by their draft history with DBs, he's got decent odds of busting. Our draft grade was screwed from day 1 by not having the 1st. No one in the national media is going to objectively look at it and say "The Bills got Watkins for what looks like a bust in Justin Gilbert and a replacement for the Browns pro bowl center who wants to leave town ASAP". We got dinged last year for trading this first and we get double jeopardy for not having it now. National people are always going to doubt us until we shut them up on the field.

These UFAs we are getting are making me feel better about this class, a lot of these guys seem of draftable quality but some teams got cute with punters and long snappers. If Collins gets cleared of charges, I'd give him a top 10 pick caliber contract. Assuming he does get clearance, I'd be surprised if someone doesn't do that.

I say this slightly tounge in cheek but slightly not- Did we bother to scout anywhere outside of the ACC? I can't kill them too much over the player Darby, from the middle of the 1st to about the middle of the 3rd the talent was pretty much the same and he was squarely in that group, I just hated seeing DB that early. Miller felt like a reach, but the oline market was thrown off and that's the guy with who they felt the most comfortable. I'm still in favor of the Watkins deal, but I can't say it didn't screw us in this draft as the missing capital prevented us from moving around the board. Would have been nice to have picks to move up to get AJ Cann in the top of the 3rd and picks to move up for Hundley in the 5th (I'm not the biggest Hundley fan, but he could be a real steal in the 5th). We ripped the bandaid of the Watkins deal off this weekend. It hurt but now it's over. For me, the bar of success for this class is very low, given what we were working with, I'd call Darby being a starting corner in Rex's system and getting one other quality starter a win. Just felt like Rex's bravado is starting to overcome the organization and Trader Doug wanted to make sure his proclamation of not having room for many rookies came true so he mailed this one in. Part of it's picking lower in the rounds and part of its not having the picks to work with, but in the past Doug has done a much better job at moving around the board, accumulating picks and still getting his guy.

Is Seantrel successful yet?

That's what I'm wondering. He flipped over at FSU because they were full of scat backs and needed a bruiser. We could use a bruiser, but I do wonder if he won't get a look on both sides of the ball. He's a quality player, his brother is a linebacker with the Steelers.

I wouldn't mind trading the rest of our draft to get one of these 3rds to grab Collins, we'd walk out of a draft where we don't have a 1st with 2 1st round level talents and a guard.